Direct low temperature hydrothermal synthesis of YFeO3 microcrystals

•A new, fast and high yield synthesis method for microcrystalline YFeO3 was developed.•We propose a formation mechanism of YFeO3 in the hydrothermal solution.•Unusual behavior of the magnetization curves (ZFC>FC) was observed.•The synthesis methods influence the magnetic properties of yttrium orthoferrite.

In this work, we present a new, fast and high yield synthesis method for obtaining microcrystalline yttrium orthoferrite YFeO3, based on hydrothermal technique. The advantage of the method consists in the direct crystallization of the material without the necessity of the calcination. The quality of the so-obtained compound is checked by X-ray diffraction and XPS measurements. Unusual behavior of the zero field cooled (ZFC) – field cooled (FC) magnetization curves (ZFC>FC) was also observed in YFeO3 and a possible explanation could be related to the effect of the synthesis methods on the magnetic properties of yttrium orthoferrite.